Larry Bohn, Nelson Pettis and Jon Fowler – give ’em some more good time!
Prisoners working in a nearby park helped save three boys whose kayak overturned in a Washington state creek, fire officials said Thursday.
Three brothers — ages 8, 10 and 16 — were floating down Salmon Creek near Salmon Creek Regional Park Wednesday afternoon when their kayak overturned, Clark County Fire District 6 Chief Jerry Green told NBC News. The park is in Washington state just north of Portland, Ore.
Ten prison inmates from the Larch Corrections Center near Yacolt, Wash., were doing park maintenance when they heard screams for help and responded quickly…
Inmate Nelson Pettis, 37, jumped into the strong current, floating downstream until he could grab the two younger boys and help them to a pile of floating debris, according to the newspaper.
“I don’t think I was thinking at all,” Pettis told The Columbian. “I was just really concentrating on getting them to safety.”
Inmate Larry Bohn, 29, helped Pettis with the rescue: “…They just seemed really scared”…
The 16-year-old boy was able to swim to shore…
Inmate Jon Fowler, 28, waited for the rescue team to arrive and helped them inflate their rescue boat, The Columbian reported…
The water was “very cold” and estimated to be moving at 25 mph, Green said. The brothers were treated for mild hypothermia, but otherwise there were no other injuries, he said. Two of the inmates were also treated for hypothermia…
Bohn and Pettis reportedly had taken off their shirts, wrapping them around the kids to keep them warm…
“I don’t think we’re heroes by any means,” inmate Fowler told The Columbian. “I think we just did what any good person would do…”
Happens more often than you think. As tough as I am on warehousing violent criminals, there are scores who are on the inside who probably shouldn’t be there in the first place. But, then, that’s a topic for a discussion about our mediocre judicial system.